New Worlds for Old

Lin Carter Justifies His Life as a Writer of Fantasy

As a fantasy writer, I am sometimes asked why I persist in limiting my
talents to what has been charitably described as "fairy tales for grown-ups."
Since I earn my living and support my family through the produce of my
typewriter, such helpful persons argue, why do I not write for a larger
audience, and reap some of the millions of dollars publishers lavish on
whomever can or cares to write a VALLEY OF THE DOLLS or LOVE STORY? Surely
I have nothing against the idea of making a million dollars? Those who
argue thus have no real conception of just how difficult writing a novel
can be, and what grisly drudgery it is to write something for which one
has no real enthusiasm or interest.

I was once a wide-eyed kid drinking in the marvels of such splendid
films as Snow White and the Seven Dwarves and The Thief of
Bagdad or lost in the fascinating pages of DOCTOR DOOLITTLE, MARY
POPPINS and the "OZ" books. A little later, a gawky teenager, I gloried in
the pages of Planet Stories, Weird Tales, Doc Savage, Unknown, and
Captain Future. That little boy, and that fascinated teenager, live
somewhere within me to this hour--nor would I have it otherwise.

This being so, it naturally followsa that I am most interested in
writing the sort of fiction that first stirred and excited and enthralled
me as a youngster, and which still entertains me and stretches my imagination
to this day. It is not so much that I would not like to write a bestseller
and make a million dollars and sell a book to the movies and appear on the
Tonight Show. It is just that, by great good luck, I am able to earn a
good living writing exactly the sort of thing I most want to write.

The problems--and the pleasures--of writing the imaginary world romance
fascinate me. I have assiduously sought out the work of those writers who
made this curious art their particular province. The list is not long, but
it is a pantheon of brilliant creative talents. I reproduce it here for
your amusement.

William Morris (1834-1896)

Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875-1950)

Lord Dunsany (1878-1957)

James Branch Cabell (1879-1958)

E. R. Eddison (1882-1945)

A. Merritt (1884-1943)

H. P. Lovecraft (1893-1937)

J. R. R. Tolkien (1892-1973)

Clark Ashton Smith (1893-1961)

Fletcher Pratt (1897-1956)

C. S. Lewis (1898-1963)

Robert E. Howard (1906-1936)

L. Sprague de Camp (1907- )

Fritz Leiber (1910-1992)

C. L. Moore (1911- )

Mervyn Peake (1911-1968)

Henry Kuttner (1914-1958)

Hannes Bok (1914-1964)

Of course, this is a list of personal favorites. It might well be
argued that since we are talking about people who consciously wrote fiction,
such earlier writers as Voltaire, or William Beckford, or George Meredith,
or George MacDonald should be included--to say nothing of such contemporary
fantasists as Jane Gaskell, T. H. White, Jack Vance, Poul Anderson, Michael
Moorcock, Andre Norton, or John Jakes. Each connoisseur will have his or
her own list of personal favorites. But the eighteen writers above seem
to me to have devoted a major portion of their careers to the delicate
art of world-making, to have done their best work in this genre, to have
"specialized" therein and thus to have excelled.

Ken speaking now: Carter goes on to justify the significance of each
of the writers on his list, but he has quit revealing things about himself,
and so I cut short this essay. If you want to read it all, you will have
to seek out NEW WORLDS FOR OLD (Ballantine, 1971). It is quite clear to me
that Carter would like to be thought of as the 19th person on this list, and
I believe he deserves the honor as much as anyone.

This all-star anthology of short fantasy includes Lin's own "Zingazar!"
which begins thusly: They say in Simrana that long had the old sword
slept in the great hall, and as it slept it dreamt of War. Simrana, of
course, is Carter's own Dreamland, and it is consciously modeled on the
work of Lord Dunsany--as was H. P. Lovecraft's. Seek it out and you shall
be rewarded!